Because i believe that this is truly important information i'm going to post
the washington post's op-ed coverage of this issue.
the new york times, not surprisingly, barely covered this issue at all.
i guess the memories of judith miller reporting white house press releases in the run up to the war
as 'news' are still too fresh...
you may think that i write too often about politics, but can't you see the importance
of this issue?
the bush administration knowingly lied to the american people and the world about
the reasons for beginning a war.
we've known that for a while, but here we have the documentation showing the
depth and extent and brazen-ness of the bush administrations collective deceit.
dismiss it if you will, but remember that the war in iraq has cost close to a TRILLION dollars
in taxpayers(aka-yours)money. the war in iraq has resulted in hundreds of thousands
of deaths. it has completely destabilized the region. and it has strained our relationships
and credibililty around the world.(it has also led to the highest oil prices in the history
of the world...think about that the next time you're filling up your car).
and it was all based on coordinated deceit on the part of bush and his administration.
moby

-Washington Post op-ed
A nonprofit group pursuing old-fashioned accountability journalism is out with a new report and database documenting 935 false statements by President Bush, Vice President Cheney and other top administration officials hyping the threat posed by Saddam Hussein's Iraq in the two years after Sept. 11, 2001.

The Center for Public Integrity reports that its "exhaustive examination of the record shows that the statements were part of an orchestrated campaign that effectively galvanized public opinion and, in the process, led the nation to war under decidedly false pretenses."

The database also documents how Bush and others had reason to know what they were saying was not supported by the facts.

There are plenty of reasons why the deceitful run-up to war is not old news. For one, the war goes on. For another, government credibility remains severely damaged. And then there's the fact that the president has never really been held to account for his repeated falsehoods.

Bush famously told The Washington Post, upon embarking on his second term, that he saw the 2004 election as his "accountability moment." Yet neither before nor since has he admitted mistakes or poor judgment. The closest he came may have been in December 2005, when he acknowledged intelligence failures -- by others.

Charles Lewis and Mark Reading-Smith write in the report's overview: "Bush and the top officials of his administration have so far largely avoided the harsh, sustained glare of formal scrutiny about their personal responsibility for the litany of repeated, false statements in the run-up to the war in Iraq. There has been no congressional investigation, for example, into what exactly was going on inside the Bush White House in that period. Congressional oversight has focused almost entirely on the quality of the U.S. government's pre-war intelligence -- not the judgment, public statements, or public accountability of its highest officials. . . .

"Short of such review, this project provides a heretofore unavailable framework for examining how the U.S. war in Iraq came to pass. Clearly, it calls into question the repeated assertions of Bush administration officials that they were the unwitting victims of bad intelligence."

The Findings

Lewis and Reading-Smith write: "President George W. Bush and seven of his administration's top officials, including Vice President Dick Cheney, National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice, and Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, made at least 935 false statements in the two years following September 11, 2001, about the national security threat posed by Saddam Hussein's Iraq. . . .

"On at least 532 separate occasions (in speeches, briefings, interviews, testimony, and the like), Bush and these three key officials, along with Secretary of State Colin Powell, Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz, and White House press secretaries Ari Fleischer and Scott McClellan, stated unequivocally that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction (or was trying to produce or obtain them), links to Al Qaeda, or both. This concerted effort was the underpinning of the Bush administration's case for war. . . .

"President Bush, for example, made 232 false statements about weapons of mass destruction in Iraq and another 28 false statements about Iraq's links to Al Qaeda. Secretary of State Powell had the second-highest total in the two-year period, with 244 false statements about weapons of mass destruction in Iraq and 10 about Iraq's links to Al Qaeda. Rumsfeld and Fleischer each made 109 false statements, followed by Wolfowitz (with 85), Rice (with 56), Cheney (with 48), and McClellan (with 14)."

NOW CHECK THIS OUT PEOPLE!!!

The study concluded that the statements "were part of an orchestrated campaign that effectively galvanized public opinion and, in the process, led the nation to war under decidedly false pretenses."

The study was posted Tuesday on the Web site of the Center for Public Integrity, which worked with the Fund for Independence in Journalism.

White House spokesman Scott Stanzel did not comment on the merits of the study Tuesday night but reiterated the administration's position that the world community viewed Iraq's leader, Saddam Hussein, as a threat.

"The actions taken in 2003 were based on the collective judgment of intelligence agencies around the world," Stanzel said.

The study counted 935 false statements in the two-year period. It found that in speeches, briefings, interviews and other venues, Bush and administration officials stated unequivocally on at least 532 occasions that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction or was trying to produce or obtain them or had links to al-Qaida or both.

"It is now beyond dispute that Iraq did not possess any weapons of mass destruction or have meaningful ties to al-Qaida," according to Charles Lewis and Mark Reading-Smith of the Fund for Independence in Journalism staff members, writing an overview of the study. "In short, the Bush administration led the nation to war on the basis of erroneous information that it methodically propagated and that culminated in military action against Iraq on March 19, 2003."

Named in the study along with Bush were top officials of the administration during the period studied: Vice President Dick Cheney, national security adviser Condoleezza Rice, Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld, Secretary of State Colin Powell, Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz and White House press secretaries Ari Fleischer and Scott McClellan.

Bush led with 259 false statements, 231 about weapons of mass destruction in Iraq and 28 about Iraq's links to al-Qaida, the study found. That was second only to Powell's 244 false statements about weapons of mass destruction in Iraq and 10 about Iraq and al-Qaida.

The center said the study was based on a database created with public statements over the two years beginning on Sept. 11, 2001, and information from more than 25 government reports, books, articles, speeches and interviews.

"The cumulative effect of these false statements — amplified by thousands of news stories and broadcasts — was massive, with the media coverage creating an almost impenetrable din for several critical months in the run-up to war," the study concluded.

"Some journalists — indeed, even some entire news organizations — have since acknowledged that their coverage during those prewar months was far too deferential and uncritical. These mea culpas notwithstanding, much of the wall-to-wall media coverage provided additional, 'independent' validation of the Bush administration's false statements about Iraq," it said.

My question is?

Now that america knows this information what's gonna happen? Is there going to be a impeachment? Or is this gonna be like every other shred of information that links bush to everything wrong with our country and we do nothing about it?

I'm joining the Marines, maybe there was no WMD's, and maybe they did lie, but it was for the benefit of the USA. Making Iraq an ally is gonna benefit us in such a good way and would avoid war here in our land, cuz now we have somebody in the middle east that could have our backs. Iran wants to destroy Israel and the USA, as long as we have a good ally in the middle east, that changes everything! Making Iraq our ally is a big blow to Iran and the rest of our enemies. They had to make something up in order for us to go there, cuz people weren't gonna understand the real reason. I support what we're fighting for and now we freed the people of Iraq, but freedom isn't free. Everything has a cost. I'll fight for my country, if I die, I died fighting for something I beleived in..and that's all that matters.